Coopbanking: It’s not just counting the eggs laid by golden goose

It’s not just counting the eggs laid by golden goose

By Maurice Malanes
Inquirer Northern Luzon

Posted date: May 29, 2010

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet – Cooperative banking is not just about people organizing themselves and pooling their resources together so they have some money to borrow when the need arises.

“Cooperative banking must also be relevant and responsive to the current issues and concerns of our times, one of which is the challenge brought about by climate change,” says Gerry Lab-oyan, general manager of the Cooperative Bank of Benguet.

Established in 1990 with a paid-up share capital of P1.25 million, the first and only cooperative bank of Benguet now has P147,392,167 in net assets (both cash and property). The pioneers of the bank were first oriented by the Land Bank of the Philippines, which sponsored a seminar on how to develop and manage cooperatives.

For Lab-oyan, cooperative banking is not only about counting and accounting the eggs laid by the golden goose.

“It is also about ensuring that the goose remains healthy so it continues to lay those golden eggs,” he says.

The golden goose is Lab-oyan’s metaphor for the community where members of the Benguet co-op bank are engaged in various businesses.

An environmentalist and a management expert, Lab-oyan is aware of the impact of a deteriorating environment on the Cordillera, especially on Benguet, whose ecosystems are being degraded by extensive commercial vegetable farms and mining.

“So it was not surprising that when Typhoon ‘Pepeng’ hit us last year, Benguet was among those badly damaged,” he says. “The damage, of course, affected our people’s livelihood and businesses.”

The damage caused by the typhoon in October prompted many borrowers of the bank to seek a moratorium in paying their loans.

Aware of the interconnection between ecology and agriculture-based businesses and livelihood, the bank has embarked on promoting alternatives to commercial vegetable farming and mining.

One of these alternatives is agro-forestry or integrating fruit-bearing and forest trees with farming. This is no wonder why the bank has been supporting initiatives to revive the Arabica coffee industry in Benguet and other parts of the upland region.

Arabica plants only need 25 percent sunlight so they need taller and bigger trees around them. Those who wish to plant Arabica, says Lab-oyan, must also plant “shade and nurse trees” such as alnus, caliandra and pine, and fruit trees such as jackfruit, star apple and other trees.

The bank has thus helped and continues to help farmers, local governments and entrepreneurs in organizing Arabica coffee councils, says Lab-oyan.

It has also helped the initiatives of the Benguet Organic Coffee Enterprises Limited Inc., a homegrown coffee processing and trading outfit, in reviving centuries-old Arabica plants.

“In helping promote the Arabica industry, we are encouraging people to plant trees, which can also help cool our planet,” says Lab-oyan.

Another thrust of the bank is promoting and helping local folk rediscover their own culture, particularly indigenous food and cuisine.

“The food recipes of our forebears were all natural and diverse,” says Lab-oyan. “And what people consume ultimately affects our environment.”

“If we go natural, we are actually promoting organic and diversified farming, which is an alternative to chemical-dependent commercial monocrop farming,” he says.

The bank has been collaborating with the La Trinidad government in organizing what it calls “Ethnic Food Festival” as part of the town’s annual Strawberry Festival.

The bank is also promoting what Lab-oyan calls “diversified agri-enterprise” and “integrated farming.” It helps finance farmers who integrate farming with raising cattle and poultry, especially those who go organic.

“The key is diversity because this is what is good for our environment,” Lab-oyan says. “And the more we diversify in our business enterprises, the more we diversify our skills so the bigger chances of success in our endeavors.”

The bank may not immediately reap the returns of what it invested in its various initiatives. “But the returns on investments on the environment and other initiatives related to helping address climate change may come in the long term such as in the form of healthier communities,” he says.

Like any other businesses, cooperative banks must also compete with other financing institutions.

“But in our co-op bank, we are not concerned only with how to stay ahead in the competition but how to be relevant also to the community,” Lab-oyan says.